We Have a Winner!

The votes for the first ever Readers’ Choice – Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction are in and counted. We have a winner!

Some important pieces of business. Special thanks to each person who voted. Your participation made this award possible!

A few well-meaning folks filled out the survey, indicating in the first question that they had not read any of the books. Because the sole requirement for participation was reading at least one of the nominations, those ballots were discarded.

In addition, a number of ballots marked as a second and/or third choice the same title they marked as a first choice. We counted the first choice but ignored the vote for second and/or third (since it’s not possible to consider a book your second or third choice when you’ve already declared it your first).

Despite the fact that 15 books were nominated, our winning novel claimed over 35 percent of the total number of first place votes. What’s more, the winner finished with over 50 votes more than the second place book.

Taking into consideration selections as the second or third choice, our winner received votes on over 50 percent of the surveys.

Clearly, readers have spoken.

The winner of the 2009 Readers’ Choice – Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction is

DragonLight by Donita K. Paul (WaterBrook)

I can’t help but think how fitting it is for Donita’s concluding book in the Dragon Keeper Chronicles to be the first winner of the CSACSF since one of her earlier volumes was the first book featured by CSFF Blog Tour.

Congratulations for this reader recognition, Donita!

*Cross posted at A Christian Worldview of Fiction.

Readers’ Choice – The 2009 Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction

Thanks to those who nominated books for this year’s award and who participated in the practice survey.

Our readers’ choice survey to determine the 2009 winner of the Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction is ready.

To be eligible to vote, you must have read at least one of the nominated books and leave a valid email address (which will not be shared or revealed or used in anyway apart from any necessary verification of eligibility). You may vote once (with the option of including a second and third choice in case no clear winner is selected as a consensus first choice). Voting will run through the end of November.

As a reminder, the nominations, in alphabetical order, are listed on the Nominations page (titles will be listed randomly in the survey).

Click here to vote for your choice.

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Please note, votes for a book as a second or third choice after it has been marked as a first choice will be disregarded.

Certainly fans and friends and family want to see their favorite authors do well. However, the only Readers’ Choice Award worth winning is one that truly reflects what book the majority of readers participating in this process identify as best.

Any endeavors to “stack the deck” turn this award into a popularity contest, not recognition of quality fiction. In short, they undermine the goals and purposes of the award. Please “play fair.”

Nominations for 2009 Award

Let’s see if we can select a book to receive the 2009 Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction. We need nominations.

These must be Christian worldview science fiction/ fantasy/allegory/furturistic/supernatural novels published in English by a royalty paying press between January 2008 and December 2008.

You may post the book title, author, and publisher you think is qualified for this award in a comment here or at Speculative Faith or at A Christian Worldview of Fiction.

Looking forward to seeing this list develop.

Cross posted at Speculative Faith and A Christian Worldview of Fiction

Clive Staples Award Update

I had forgotten that PollDaddy not only creates polls but it allows for surveys as well. I think the survey might answer a lot of the concerns voiced in our last discussion.

I’ve made a practice survey for those interested. I’d love to have feedback on things like requiring a name and email address as well as adding second and third choices, so if you have a minute, would you mind taking this non-survey survey?

BTW, I was thinking the second and third choices could either be weighted, or they could factor in if there is no clear winner.

I’m also thinking we should have a first round and a final round, with just the top three finalists on that last survey.

What else should be included?

Do you think the survey will eliminate some of the concerns about cheating?

So here it is: The Practice Readers Choice Survey for the 2009 Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction.

Thoughts on the Clive Staples Award

The idea to create an award for Christian speculative fiction came about two years ago when the Christy Awards omitted the speculative category. After considerable discussion here and at Speculative Faith, we settled on the Clive Staples Award as the name for this reader-initiated recognition of top Christian speculative fiction.

For the last two years we collected nominations, using the same guidelines as the Christy Awards. However, in both years, the actual awarding of a winner bogged down because we have no sponsor, no agreement with publishers to provide judges with books, and no judges.

The most serious problem was this latter issue. While I say “no judges,” that’s not completely accurate. We had a handful of people who volunteered to help judge, but no one who volunteered to head up the judging—requesting books, sending them out to judges, tabulating judge sheets and/or spearheading discussions to arrive at a consensus regarding finalists.

Beyond that, we agreed the award, if it was to carry any significance, would need finalist judges of some standing. I preferred someone outside the publishing business to avoid the appearance of partiality, but well informed about speculative fiction. Unfortunately, the people I contacted for that role declined to take part.

So where does that leave the award? Is it over before it actually began?

I’m thinking, this may be the kind of thing that needs to build momentum, to gain in popularity, and thus garner more support as a result. So my current thought is, why not start with a reader award? Not only do readers nominate but readers vote for the three books they want to see in the finals. Then maybe those volunteer judges, if they are still willing to participate, can pick a winner. Or readers can vote again between the three finalists.

We’d need to conduct this contest over several months to get the word out and to give readers time to check out the nominations they haven’t yet read.

We’d have to set some ground rules in an effort to curtail popularity voting (I haven’t read his book, but I sure like so-and-so, so I’ll happily vote for his novel). I can’t think of a way to eliminate that sort of thing completely, but if the award becomes linked with “readers” right from the start, it might alleviate campaigning among non-readers.

Some time ago I set up a site for the award as a kind of home base, but with no activity, there’s been no real reason to send people there. If you’d like to take a look at it, go to the Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction.

Since WordPress and PollDaddy make it so easy to include polls, I’m thinking it would be easiest if I started a series of polls to get your feedback. I’ll also need your help passing the word on to anyone else you know who has interest in this genre and particularly in creating this award. Let me know what questions you have, and we can find out what others are thinking about any number of subjects related to making this award work. If there’s still interest in doing so. Which actually is the first question.

I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

Clive Staples Award Nominations – 2008

Nominations for the 2008 Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction are:

Auralia’s Colors by Jeffrey Overstreet (WaterBrook)
Demon: A Memoir by Tosca Lee (NavPress)
DragonFire by Donita K. Paul (Waterbrook)
Father of Dragons by L.B. Graham (P&R)
Fearless by Robin Parrish (Bethany House)
Flashpoint by Frank Creed (The Writers Cafe Press)
Isle of Swords by Wayne Thomas Batson (Thomas Nelson)
Landon Snow and the Volucer Dragon by Randy Mortenson (Barbour)
The Legend of the Firefish by George Bryan Polivka (Harvest House)
The Restorer by Sharon Hinck (NavPress)
The Restorer’s Son by Sharon Hinck (NavPress)
Scarlet by Stephen Lawhead (Thomas Nelson)
A Wine Red Silence by George L. Duncan (Capstone Fiction)
Wind Follower by Carole McDonnell (Juno Books)